This is the blog of Eco-Vista | Brent Stephenson, a wildlife photographer, guide, and birder based near Napier, New Zealand. His wildlife, landscape, and people images can be discovered at his portfolio website.

Saturday, 21 May 2011

The horny chaffinch

Chaffinches are a pretty stunning bird. I reckon it is hard to beat a male in fresh breeding plumage...that was until I met the Madeiran chaffinches! These are a separate sub-species, but are vastly different in plumage, and today I managed to see them up close and personal.

This morning it was up early and I headed off with a couple of the Spanish guys who have been doing the pelagics with us (Jose, Juan, and Antonio). We headed up into the mountains to look mainly for Trocaz pigeon (one of the endemics), knowing that we would get the Madeiran firecrest and chaffinch along the way. Well we got the firecrest and chaffinch alright, but the pigeon was scarce on the ground and although we ended up hearing a couple take off, I didn't manage to see them. Nevermind. At Ribeiro Frio we walked out to the scenic lookout at Balcoes which is really gorgeous, but after about 1.5 hours we hadn't managed the pigeon, but found a 'flock' of very friendly chaffinchs. The males were absolutely stunning and were obviously trying to strut their stuff at this time of the year in front of the females. I got some cracking photos, and observed males doing a display which I have never seen in chaffinches before. The males super extended their necks and somehow puffed themselves out, strange, but pretty cool.

After some more 'fruit-less' pigeon searching we headed back into town and then out on the last of our three pelagics. The wind had dropped a little, and the sea slightly also, but still some big swell with 2-3m +, so a little bumpy going out, but not as bad as expected. We headed north again as with our first day, and strangely saw almost no Bulwer's petrels until we were right out, and then only a few. Once we got to about 15 miles off we started chumming. It was pretty overcast, so the light was not as great as yesterday, and the birds were a little slow too. But we had the usual suspects of Bulwer's petrels, Cory's shearwaters and a few Manx's. After a good hour or more our one and only Pterodroma came in, but gave absolutely crippling views, going around and around the slick for a good 4-5 minutes. Stunning views, and before we had even reviewed photographs we all agreed it was a Zino's. Photos do seem to confirm this.

Things went a little quiet again, but then a white-faced storm-petrel turned up. It held off down the end of the chum slick and pattered away happily. Then a European storm-petrel arrived and flitted about quite a bit, sometimes quite close to the white-faced. A little while later a larger storm-petrel came in and we quickly realised it was a Madeiran storm-petrel. However, it didn't stay for long, but disappeared, seemingly to have gone off to get it's mates. Because a little while later we had five in view at once! We had absolutely stunning views of a species that often doesn't stick around for long, within 2m of the boat at times, often 2-3 birds at once, and so at one stage had THREE species of storm-petrel feeding in the slick! AND THEN A WILSON'S STORM-PETREL ARRIVED! FOUR species of storm-petrel right there in front of us at once. It was absolutely superb! Only problem was the light was fading and so the photos really aren't going to be stunners...but you can't have it all.

So we headed back in as it was getting dark, arriving in and going through some of the photos from the previous days on my laptop. Have to say, I'm pretty chuffed with what I have managed to get over the last few days, and thanks must go to Hugo and Catarina at Madeira Wind Birds for doing such great trips, thanks guys!

Thanks Szimi!Appreciate the kind words. Madeira is awesome, the pelagics are fantastic and Madeira Wind Birds really know their stuff. Get in touch with them or look on their website for dates their 3-day pelagics are running.Cheers,Brent